It’s easy to fall back into old habits. Especially when you get with friends from long ago or people you used to work with. (click the link to read more)

July 4, 2017

GN 19:15-29

PS 26:2-3, 9-10, 11-12

MT 8:23-27

It’s easy to fall back into old habits.   Especially when you get with friends from long ago or people you used to work with.  As a former construction foreman, I know all too well how the mind can make thoughts of our old ways seem joyful.   We reminisce together about days of old and often tell stories with almost a sense of pride.  Stories that are often of things we should never have been doing, and definitely shouldn't be happy we partook of.   Words that we thought we had kicked the habit of using come out of our mouths before we even realize we have said them.   It’s as if our flesh takes joy in all those carnal and sensual things, even though our mind knows they weren’t good for us then and still aren’t today.

Lots family were in the land he chose for them.  Abraham had given him the option.   Lot seeing how fertile and modern this land was wanted it for his own.   God saw the danger coming and sent messengers, at the request of Abraham, to Lot and his family telling them to flee.  In the process of leaving this life of sin, Lot’s wife looks back at what she is leaving behind.  It’s a tale of sorrow and sadness.  Was she reminiscing?  Was she so used to the city life that going back to living in the secluded country would be such a hardship?   Did she miss her friends? Her things?   Those thoughts we will never know.  What we do know is that spiritually it’s an emblem of all those times we look back at what we gave up with longing, instead of looking forward to the salvation offered to us by our God.

Just like Lot’s family, God was with the disciples on the boat during the storm.  Instead of keeping their eyes on Him, their faith in God’s provision, they looked out at the gathering waves, lightning, and crashes of thunder.   It’s easy to do.   Knowing who Jesus is, and knowing He promised to be there with them, they still on some level didn’t understand.  Like Lot’s wife, they were busy looking at the world, and not at the Lord.  We too should keep that in mind during the storms of our daily lives.  Jesus is present there and guiding us towards the destination.  He asks us to put our hands to the plow and never look back.  It is precisely during the storms that it is most important to keep our eyes on Christ, to head in the direction He has directed us, even if it’s hard to see or understand the outcome.   Then having done our very best to follow, knowing that Jesus is right there with us as we trudge along.

 His servant and yours,

Brian Mullins

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my rock, and my redeemer. - Psalm 19:14  

It is interesting how we each react in a different way to God’s presence in our life. Sometimes we have mountaintop moments that encourage and lift us to new heights. (Click the link to read more)

July 5, 2017

Wednesday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 379

GN 21:5, 8-20A

PS 34:7-8, 10-11, 12-13

MT 8:28-34

Luigi Alois Gillarduzzi Hagar und Ismael in der Wüste 1851

It is interesting how we each react in a different way to God’s presence in our life.  Sometimes we have mountaintop moments that encourage and lift us to new heights.   Others have experiences that frighten them or leave them feeling ashamed and fearful.  The one thing that can be said is that no matter what happens when one encounters God they will never be the same again.   Jesus, the incarnation of God, demands that of us by his very presence.  We must either choose to follow Him or reject Him.  As He points out in the Apocryphal book of Revelation, being lukewarm is not an option.  Either we are hot or cold.  

Abraham encounters God at a moment that to our modern sensibilities seems cold and aloof.  His wife has now had a child of her own and demands that Abraham's slave and son must be sent off.   In the time period when this happened and the culture that they were a part of, this was not an unusual request.  Abraham could have simply expelled them and left them to die.  The world around them was full of those who sacrificed their children to Gods or abandoned the weak and only cared for the strong.   Instead, we are reminded of the promise of Abraham, wherein God has promised to bless the entirety of the world.   Through Ishmael, some of those blessings will pour out as well, but Isaac is the child of the covenant, the promise.  One scholar says that this ‘mellowed’ Abraham.  I think that is a lackluster description of what it must have done for a father to push away his first born son.

Whereas Abraham was faithful to God and trusted, the Gadarenes rejected the divinity among them.   Instead of seeing Jesus as a deliverer who had saved one of their own from demonic possession and a healer, they see Him as a threat to their local economy and way of life.  When given a chance for conversion of their own they reject the one who can bring them true joy and happiness and beg Him to leave.  We often forget that simple truth: an encounter with God does not always lead to faith.  When we offer the Gospel to others, reasonably and rationally, and they reject it…. Often it makes no sense to us who have faith that they would do so.   How can their hearts be hardened to such a beautiful and joy filled truth?  It is because it challenges.  The Gospel doesn’t leave us where we are, it challenges us to change and go forth and sin no more.   It’s not enough to just say we believe, like Abraham we set out on a journey and do the actions demanded of us from God, trusting that even when we don’t understand, He will provide the Sacrifice necessary for any of our actions to have value.  On their own, they are nothing. United to Christ they are made complete.

His servant and yours,
Brian Mullins

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my rock, and my redeemer. - Psalm 19:14  

And the lava flowed into the sea...

I remember as a young man seeing video of a volcano for the first time.  The lava was flowing down the mountain into the ocean.   When it touched the water, it roiled and exploded.   Such raw power, such destruction!   I was filled with fear that such a thing could happen to us!  I knew there were no active volcanoes anywhere near our home in Virginia.   Yet, the image was stuck in my mind and for days I couldn't sleep for fear of seeing them in my dreams.  That's the image that the Israelites experienced first hand in the desert of God.   Loud booming sounds, smoke and fire, lightning and thunder.   An image of God so terrifying that they begged Moses to go intercede for them for fear that just hearing God's voice would cause them to die.

The author of Hebrews gives us a different image of God.  That of a 'festal' gathering.  A party!  Recently I went to a wedding with Julie's family.   It had been years since we had been to anything of this sort.  With work and the kids we just couldn't find time or the money to go.   When we arrived though, we were welcomed with open arms and warm familial hugs.   We didn't feel out of place, but rather felt we were part of the family... The words that come to mind are: familiar, warm, inviting, peaceful, joyful, welcome.   That's the image we get of Heaven.   Not something to be feared, but a place to long for.   A gathering around the wedding feast of the Lamb where "everyone knows your name."

The key to being invited though, the key to the entire walk of the Christian life, is humility.   Not some false humility where one puts themselves down in order to make them look even more 'humble' than someone else, but a true sense of humility in which we realize exactly who we are.  An honest assessment of ourselves. A recognition that we are indeed sinners, and yet are called adopted Sons/Daughters of the most High!   That we are fallen in nature but chosen in calling.   Acceptance of the fact that we are holy, set apart, consecrated for God... not in some haughty manner, but in gentle, silent awe filled wonder that we are who God says we are.... that kind of humility allows us to take the lesser seat.   To sit at the foot of the table.  Because we know that's where we belong... and if God left us there?  We would have no qualms, no quarrels of sitting with the least of our brothers....

It's there that we encounter Christ in the here and now.   In the eyes of the distressful disguises that He chooses to wear.   In the outcast, the orphan, the widow... the broken, the fallen, the addicted, the scared... yes, there that we sit with Him at the table... Yet we are called to be like Christ in all things, yes?   To be not just guests at the wedding, but co-hosts with our adopted Brother.   Are you doing your part?  Are you going out to the honored guest and lifting them up to a higher place?  It's in the sick, the poor, the angry, the unappreciated, the fallen away, the mangled up, chewed up, and spit out person that we encounter Christ face to face... are you helping Him find a higher place at the table?  Christ deserves the seat of honor.. the highest praise... the best meal and the best plates... are you offering Him the best you have?  Or are you leaving Him sitting at the lower end of the table while you sit with those who make you comfortable?

We have work to do Church... more especially I have work to do.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

 A reflection on the readings for the Twenty Second Sunday in Ordinary Time: August 28th, 2016.  Sirach 3:17-18, 20, 28-29; Psalm 68:4-5, 6-7, 10-11; Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24; Luke 14:1, 7-14

Truth. What is truth?

We often judge people based on our own vision of them.   I had a neighbor once who was a cranky old man.   Everyone warned me to not only stay away from him, but to keep my kids away from him too.   One day I walked over and asked how he was doing.   He was having some issues with his house and couldn't go up under it to check on it.   I ended up crawling under his trailer for a few minutes to find that his heat tape had been unplugged.   I plugged it back up, problem solved.   Over the next few years I got to know him pretty well.  Yes, he was cranky.  Yes, he was pretty inappropriate at times.   He had a huge heart though.   I had judged him wrongly by listening to others talk about him, and even in my own way expected certain things out of him.  My vision is limited.

God on the other hand looks inside the person.   He glimpses the inmost emotions of our hearts.   In today's Gospel Jesus declares that Nathanael  is a man with no duplicity!  Nathanael tells it like it is.   In fact, he is just a little bit rude in what he has to say today.  As the kids would say: "savage."   When he hears that Philip thinks Jesus is the Messiah he responds "from Nazareth? pfft."   The one thing Jesus knows about Nathanael is that he is who he is, whether you are there or not.  Honest.  Maybe to a fault.   The thing is though, Nathanael is then astounded that Jesus knew something very simple about him.  Jesus reminds him that greater things are to come.

du·plic·i·tyd(y)o͞oˈplisədē/noun1.
deceitfulness; double-dealing.

synonyms:

deceitfulness, deceit, deception, double-dealing, underhandedness, dishonesty, fraud,fraudulence, sharp practice, chicanery, trickery, subterfuge, skulduggery, treachery;More

2.
archaicdoubleness.

You see, this man who is astounded that Jesus saw him in the mundane, would go on to realize that it is in the mundane that we can see Jesus.   We judge people so much that we fail to see Him in them.   We are so busy looking for those big mountain top moments, that we fail to encounter Him in the silence and in the other.  So many think that if I could just become a missionary, or if I were a monk or a nun, then I could be Holy!   You are Holy now!   Yes, there is something amazing about being on a retreat or in Adoration for hours on end... but that same Jesus can be present to you in your every day life.   That is truth!

It's not enough to only encounter Him at Mass, though this is our most important prayer.   Worship should be a priority in our lives.   However we should be attempting to encounter Him where we are, when we are.   There is this saying: "if slaughter houses had glass walls, the world would becoming vegetarian."   I don't know that it is true.   What I do know is that if all walls were transparent we'd see that every person out there has some sin in their lives.   Sin that we tend to hide behind walls, in closets, or under the guise of perfection.   It's we, the sinners, who He came to encounter.  He comes to encounter us daily.  Not just once a day, not just once a week, not just here or there.. but He wants to encounter us every second.   Until our live becomes living prayer, a perfect communion with the Father, one that is only possible when we begin to let Him show us the world, through His eyes.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

A reflection on the readings for the Feast of Saint Bartholomew, Apostle: August 24, 2016.  Revelation 21:9b-14; Psalm 145; The Holy Gospel according to Saint John 1:45-51

I did it my way

I’ve told this story before.  The story of sitting on the riverbank of the Mississippi at the White House in Saint Louis, Missouri.   How that the sun was shinning, the birds singing, the river flowing it’s long easy strides.   That I was sitting there meditating on being thankful and how awestruck we should be at the generosity of God.   There I was having this beautiful moment of relaxation with the beauty of nature when the thought occurred to me:  This moment would be perfect if a deer would just walk out of the woods right now.  God had created a moment in which I could encounter Him on a greater level, a moment in which the temporal could touch the infinite… a perfect moment.   There I was trying to be God.

Our first reading shows us that times haven’t changed much in that regards.  Just like I on the riverbank that Mark Twain made famous sought to perfect a moment that was already perfect, the world tries to tell us what makes us happy.   Frank Sinatra once sang a song called “I did it my way.”  In that song he lauds that his life is coming to an end, and that he always did it his way.  Later in his life he was known to complain about the song.   His daughter said he described it as like having something on his shoe, something unpleasant that you just couldn’t get off.  It was too ego centric, too self serving.  It reminds me of that saying the kids have, “I’ll do me, and let you do you.”   You be your own truth, and I’ll be my own truth, and we’ll be both be happy.  Yet, very few of us are happy.

The Saints show us a different way.  In their emulation of Christ they instead put others first.   They put their egos aside and serve God and man instead.   They let their own wants and needs go to the way side.  They aren’t concerned with honor, or glory, or riches or fame.   Recognition at the end of the day is not their concern.   Mother Teresa was once told by someone that they wouldn’t do what we she did for a million dollars.  She replied, “I wouldn’t do it for a million dollars either!”   She realized that the true reward is not in the comforts of this life, but in the joy of communion with Christ.  Not just in Heaven, not just in the Sacraments, but also in each other.  In the faces of those distressing disguises that Christ is wont to wear: the poor, the widow, the orphan, the refugee, the sinner.

Christ on the cross shows us the fulfillment of life.   The Disciples were confounded when He said that it was near impossible for a rich and wealthy person to enter the kingdom of Heaven.  The Jews in first century Palestine, like many of the people today, had a sort of prosperity Gospel understanding of how things worked.   The more God loved you?  The more you had.  The less favor with God?  The poorer and sicker they were.  Jesus turned that on it’s head.  The first, the most honored, wealthy and powerful King of all times and places?  Died destitute on the cross.  The first was last in the eyes of the world, but the last in the eyes of the world? Is first and foremost in Heaven.    That’s true happiness… right there on the crucifix.   A man with no wealth, no power, no honor, no pleasure…. But living out the will of the Father.   Dying in the place of all of us as the greatest act of love in the history of everything!   

That’s our challenge as well.  To die to self that we might serve others.   Not to make God an afterthought… not to get everything else in order first, and then.. After work, health, retirement, vacation, school, kids and all the other things we add in there, to find a moment for God… Rather to put God in their first.. And then place the rest around Him and in His arms… That is lasting joy.

His servant and yours,

Brian

“He must increase, I must decrease.”

A reflection on the readings for daily Mass for Tuesday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time:  Ezekiel 28:1-10; Deuteronomy 32; The Holy Gospel according to Matthew 19:23-30

Like and Oil and Water, so are the days of our lives.

I moved out of my parents home into a house they had generously given me when I was just shy of eighteen. I remember making many, many mistakes.   One that comes to mind this morning involved being in a hurry to get back to whatever I was doing but trying to cook at the same time.   I decided to deep fry some 'tater-tots' so I could have a quick snack.   In my hurry to get back to the computer, or tv, or whatever it was... I forgot to take off that little plastic cover you put on top to keep the oil from getting stuff in it.  A few minutes later I smelt smoke.  Running into the kitchen I saw fire literally licking the ceiling tile!   I grabbed the thing off the oven and put it on the floor so the fire couldn't touch the roof.   Then I grabbed a glass of water off the nearby counter and threw it in it.   As flames engulfed my face and hair began to dissipate like the morning dew, I realized the truth of the saying oil and water do not mix.

I believe that to be the crux of the message from Jesus in the gospel today.   Some would use this verse to allow anger and hatred to rule in their lives.  To claim that anyone who stands in their way is simply doing so because they are a 'good Christian.'  Jesus is not giving us permission to be hateful.   He is not saying that we can ignore the rest of the Gospel and lose our joy, our kindness and our love.   No, rather He is giving us a dire warning.   That good and evil do not mix.   That often the response to our Christian walk and the message we bear will be an explosion.   That like the oil that splattered on my legs going straight through the skin, people will often blow up and respond with anger and division.   We are to love them anyway... to care for them... even at the cost of our own lives, our own desires.

In today's world were people soften the message of Christ, the cross becomes a thing of the past.   That's not what Jesus demands of us.  These three readings grouped together remind us of the price of discipleship.   That our goal is not one of flowers and rainbows, gentle currents and soft beds, but the discomfort of Calvary.   We are challenged to live our faith with joy amidst persecution, love amidst hate, a friendly demeanor when all others are bearing down upon us.  The early Church realized that Christianity was a call to martyrdom, a call to give up our lives if need be, without rejected the faith.   In all of this they realized that God's mercy was beyond anything we could fathom, but that the call was not lessened by that, but strengthened in the example set forth by the incarnation of God himself and the Way of the Cross.

With Christian martyrs in the recent news, displaced Christians being persecuted and martyred in many nations, and some making the claim that "in this century [we are[ witnessing more shedding of Christian blood than any of the previous twenty"; our eyes turn toward the past and the future.. but we must need live in the present.  You and I in the comfort of America likely will not be called to give our lives for our faith, though it is not out of the realm of possibilities.    The challenge for us at the current moment is: to die to our own selves.   To live our lives in a way that shows us to be servants of Christ.   To look for Him in every encounter with others and ask How can I feed them?  How can I give them drink?  How can I clothe them?  That means both physically and spiritually.   To ever be prepared to give "an account for the hope that is in us." (1 Peter 3:15)  Is there anything standing the way of that?   Anything stopping me from serving the widow, the orphan, the refugee?   The victim and the bully?  Until we become detached from those things which stand in the way of complete abandonment to Christ and His calling, Paul reminds us that we "have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood."  

What is preventing you from being the person you were created to be?  Fix that first.  Work on your relationship with God first and everything else will fall into place.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

A reflection on the readings for the Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time:  August 14th, 2016.  Jeremiah 38:4-6, 8-10; Psalm 40; Hebrews 12:1-4; The Holy Gospel according to Luke 12:49-53

The party don't start till I walk in...

In many movies we see the youth getting away with throwing a party while the parents are gone.  The party gets out of control and the house is trashed.  The parents, who were supposed to be gone a set number of days or hours, for some reason come home early.  Somehow the kids get everything cleaned up as if by magic before they arrive.   In the movies this seems to work so well that the parents are none the wiser to what has happened in their home while they are away.  In real life?   Well, it doesn't ever seem to work out that way.   

In this day and age our lives are highly scheduled and our lives filled with digital communication.  Not only do our kids know when we are supposed to be home, but they often receive a text on the way or a phone call from the car.   With all of this information we humans tend to be less ready for the arrival, not more.  We get distracted by all the things that are bombarding us and instead of doing that which we know to do?  We end up 'shinied'.   Distracted.  Unable to focus on what needs to be finished.  The parents arrive and not only aren't the kids finished?  They haven't started.  In this case it's not just the kids, but the parents too.   We know someone is coming over and we meant to clean, but the show was on... or we should have gone to confession... but the game was on... We schedule to do things, but then we find other things to do and forget the schedule. 

The thing we lose about this Gospel parable in today's modern age is exactly how hard it is to be ready for the Master when he returns.   Jesus talks of a man coming back from a wedding to find his servant up and waiting.  The servant's just doing what he should be doing right?  It's what he is for.   He's not doing something extraordinary on the surface, he's just serving his Master by being ready for his return.   When will the master be back?   Now that's the hard part.   Weddings in first century Palestine were not like they are today.  They were an involved affair!   Taking several days, a week or more!   The servant couldn't possibly stay up the entire time, could he?  How diligent would he have to be to be ready and waiting for the Master's return?  Unlike us He wasn't going to receive a text or phone call during the week to say "I'll be back on Friday!" 

I believe that the readings for today are a call to Stewardship and preparedness.   They remind us of what Pope Francis was trying to teach us in Ladauto Si.  We have been given charge of a home, a place to keep up and take care of.   We aren't doing a very good job of that.  Not just creation, which I am a big proponent of, but also our selves and each other.  The Master has given us signs of his return, but informed us that no one, not even Jesus himself, knows the day of His return.. only the Father.   So we must be diligent.  We must be ready for Him at any time.   Like the servant in the parable, are we awake?  Do we take care of the world we are given?  Our own bodies that are temples of the Holy Spirit?   Others that we encounter during the day?  As my friend always says, "Get ready, be ready, stay ready."  

His servant and yours, 

Brian 

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A reflection on the readings for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time: August 7th, 2016.  Wisdom 18:6-9; Psalm 33; Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-19; The Holy Gospel According to Saint Luke 12:32-48

What does it mean to be among the wheat?

It's hard to trust when things are difficult.  As a child I was blessed with a good home.  We had more than we needed and parents who loved us.  Spanking and other forms of punishment were rare but respect was held in high esteem.  When things got rough we were always told "It'll get better."  It did.   It was hard to see that though during the rough times.   When mom and dad were both hurt and unable to work it seemed like we would never get our heads above the water.   It took a lot of effort to trust both them, and to trust God, that things would work out for good in the end.

I had a long conversation with a friend that reminded me of how hopeless things can seem.  Just turning on the news or watching one of the political conventions can truly make things seem as if they are going to Hell in a hand basket.  War, famine, terrorism, Mass killings, climate change deniers and climate change fear mongers.... where does one find hope?   Many years ago I spent all of my time sitting on the computer researching the 'end of the world.'   I was consumed with it.  I kept my mind so fixated on the negative things happening trying to tie them to this or that, that I never took time to truly fix my mind on God... on trust...  One is hopeless when they have no good to cling to.

When we read the Sacred Scriptures we see an overarching promise: God will provide!  He looks out for those who are poor and helpless.   He takes care of us in our time of need.   He cares for us more than we can fathom and He has promised that we will be among the wheat at the end of time when the harvest comes.  His Word has been planted in our hearts and we have become heirs to the promise that was given to David, a promise of an immortal Kingdom that will last forever.   Jesus in the Gospel, in explaining this parable to the disciples, gives them insight into something that should give us joy!  It should make us exuberant and our souls exulting with Hope in the promise of God himself!

What though does it mean to be wheat?  The children of the Devil are the false wheat it says, and the children of God the true wheat... How then can we tell the difference?   That's the thing about false wheat (Darnel), it's very hard to tell until it's ripe.  You see when wheat begins to ripen the grain begins to become too heavy for the shaft to support... so it begins to bow down.   Darnel doesn't do this... it remains upright.  The difference between real wheat and false wheat is that real wheat bows down.  It doesn't remain too proud, too egoistic, to self consumed to kneel in humility.  Are we being wheat then?  Are we kneeling before God and obeying His teachings as received by the Apostles?  Or are we doing things our own way?  Refusing to bend or submit?  Will you be the wheat or the chaff?

Today we are reminded of Saint Anne and Joachim, the mother and father of Mary, the grandparents of Jesus.   It is a day we should pray for our parents, for our grandparents, and for the humility to be like their daughter Mary.   May we learn to be like her in all things, the Immaculate Disciple who gave a complete and resounding Yes to God's plan in humility and love.   In all things she replied "Do whatever He tells you."  So call your parents, call your grandparents, call your children today and wish them love, wish them happiness, and pray for them that they too may have the grace to be His servant too.


His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A reflection on the readings for daily Mass for Tuesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time, the Memorial of Saints Joachim and Anne: July 26, 2016.   Jeremiah 14:17-22, Psalm 79, The Holy Gospel According to Matthew 13:36-43

Perfectly Imperfect

People do change.   Their base personality and faculties define who they are, not their behavior.  Behavior is something we do, not who we are.  The man I was in my twenties is not the man I am now, nor am I the man I hope to be ten  years from now.   What is important is not who we were, but who are now and who we are becoming.   That's what being a disciple is about.  Changing from the fallen person we have become into the person we were created as and to be, with Christ giving us the premier example of how to do that.

The twelve themselves were imperfect men.  They argued.  They fell short at times in understanding what Jesus was saying.   They had petty rivalries and jealousies.   At the foot of the cross we don't see those who jump up to say they would die with Him, save for John.  Impetuous Peter denied Him three times and went on to be the first of all the Apostles.  The thing is they were all changed, they all experienced a radical about face in their lives by encountering Christ.  All but John were martyred for their faith.  John was tortured as well and they tried to kill him, but when they failed they exiled him to a remote island to lessen his influence.  All were imperfect, but all were created for a purpose.

You see their character never changed.  You and I were created to be the person that we are.  God gave us a personality, intellectual abilities, a mind to think to with, a heart to feel with, and a memory to help us learn.  All of this he handed us with free will.  God does not ask you to become a mirror image of someone else, but rather to live the walk of Christ as you are able, in the way you are able to do it.  That doesn't mean we all don't do the same action.. but that we do it to the best of our ability as who we are.  For some that means being in the choir.  For others a Lector.   For still others helping with kids in the back.  For one a mother or father, for another a single lay man or woman on a missionary journey.   For some it means going across the world to experience new thrills... and for another staying right where they were born for their entire lives to serve those in that community.   God has a purpose for each and every one of us, and designed us unique with that purpose in mind.

We like James, John and Peter are quick when asked to drink of that cup to resound with an emphatic "Yes Lord!"   Do we truly count the cost of that? When your cup is drained to the dregs and all that is left is one drop of drink along with the dust and grime of daily life in some muddled mess that a seer might try to read for a glimpse of the future, are you ready to give that away?  Society teaches us to be selfish and to hold back that last part for ourselves... and while it's important to get away in prayer and to live our primary vocations as good parents, family, priests and servants; we are asked again by Christ are you ready to pour your life out like a libation?   To pour out every drop until you give your very life for another?  Not just the ones who are dear to you.. but the ones who challenge you?   The stranger?  The angry man at the office that gets on your nerves?  The one who breaths like Darth Vader while you're trying to listen to someone speak?  To the woman who talks bad about you?   To the widow? The orphan?   The homeless man on the street who smells of alcohol?   The refugee whose faith has been portrayed as one of a killer?  The guy who chews potato chips so loudly it sounds as if fire crackers are going off in your skull? Will you pour it out to them?   Christ did on the cross.  That is what He is asking you right now, when he says "Can you drink the cup that I shall drink?"

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A reflection the daily Mass readings for the Feast of Saint James: July 25th, 2016.   Corinthians 4:7-15; Psalm 126; The Holy Gospel According to Matthew 20:20-28

Speak Life

There are so many times that I have been given the opportunity to be an evangelist for Christ and allowed my fallen human nature to get in the way.   I was at a Cracker Barrel with some friends.   I went up to the register to pay on the way out.   A young man behind the counter commented on my necklace.  He said he had been meaning to get something to wear.   He said he just didn't know which to get because he was, and I quote here, "A Catholic and a Christian."   It was a moment to evangelize, a moment to teach and tell him that all Catholic's are Christians, but not all Christians are Catholics.   I didn't though... I just talked about the different kinds of crucifixes and crosses and encouraged him to get one.   Something inside of me kept me from going further and encountering this person on a deeper level.

Jeremiah reminds us that God encounters us on so deep a personal level that He Himself forms us in our mother's womb.   We are reminded time and again in the Sacred Scriptures that we are created in the image of God.  Like a loving artisan, God works directly and intimately with our very being.  Making us into one race, not many.   Each person created unique with a distinct personality and specific gifts.  He knows us before even our parents are aware of our existence.    How much more personal a relationship with God can we have than to be created by Him, not as some identical automaton among the many.. but as an individual, a singular diamond... a treasured possession.

We are made in the image of the God who speaks and creates.   He speaks life.   He speaks love.   He, the Father, spoke one single Word.   That Word was revealed to us in the incarnation as the "Word became flesh and dwelt among us."   Jesus is the Word of God.   In every action Jesus provides a perfect example of evangelization.     He never proselytizes, even the son of God never seeks to force conversion... He instead encounters the person.   He gets to the heart of the matter for those who are seeking to come closer, those who are trying in earnest to find God.  He never tells them to just continue sinning or misses an opportunity to reach out to a fallen child of God, but rather touches them in a way that leaves them hopeful or challenged.  That is the image of a God who never leaves a person behind unchanged.

In the Gospel parable we see the Word of God being planted like a seed.   The myriad temptations of this world seek to harden the soil of our hearts.   To create an environment internally that inhibits the growth of that seed.   The devil and evil spirits prowl about seeking to devour, to destroy any hope of that seed forming.  They want to pluck the seed out before it has a chance to change us.   Pleasure, honor, power, and wealth all seek to grow up in our hearts as false idols to choke out and destroy any image of God within us.   We must be co-workers with the Lord, laboring to prepare the soil of our hearts to not only receive the Word, but to nourish it and let it grow within us as a fertile and rich environment for Life.    That is what has been planted in us, the Word of eternal life, Life itself.

Then, we also must become planters of the Word.   Going out into the world to speak Life.   In a world hurting with racial divides, abortion on demand, rampant drug use, hatred towards the police sworn to protect us, and a million excuses that desire to create in us an environment where we justify sin... In a realm where men and women fleeing persecution by regimes of hate are turned away by 'Christian' nations.... In a society where speaking about Christ is in and of itself taboo, casual sex is on the rise, the family and marriage are being relegated to things of the past, and selfishness is even lauded in the music.... We are challenged to speak Life.. to speak Love... to speak hope.  To the poor, the broken, to the hurting... we are to be an image of the Word... one who never is complacent towards sin, but always encounters on a personal level.. and leaves every person they encounter changed in some small way.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

A Reflection on the readings for Wednesday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time: July 20th, 2016.  Jeremiah 1:1, 4-10;  Psalm 71; The Holy Gospel According to Saint Matthew 13:1-9

Oh Deer......

Recently on a silent retreat we were encouraged to meditate on thankfulness as we sat on this beautiful outlook, overlooking the great Mississippi river.   The previous afternoon during our one hour of fellowship I was telling my friends about the frog I had been meditating on the morning before.   They told me about humming birds, eagles, deer, rabbits, and butterflies.   How wonderful the diversity of life in this place! As I sat there watching the golden rays of the sun crest the morning sky, a butterfly passed by.   A red tailed hawk flew overhead and a rabbit scampered on the trail below.   The breeze was picking up and I was in awe of the beauty of the moment.  Then I thought, this moment would be perfect if a deer would just walk out of the forest right now.

How frustrating that must be for our Heavenly Father.   To be in a relationship with a stiff necked people who are never happy with what He offers them.  Here I was meditating on being thankful for the moment and even in that moment had notes for God on how to make it better, instead of just being content and happy with the beauty and grace I was already receiving.  There are times when I am just in an ill mood.  My wife tells me when I am in that mood she can do nothing right, nothing seems to calm me down.   How horrible that must be for her!  To not be the cause of my angst and yet be the one to receive the annoyances and ire. God gets even worse from us.

In the Gospel for today Jesus has brought to the people the glorious and wonderous news that God is offering forgiveness to all people!   Eternal life!  He offers it with a simple message, love God and your neighbor.  It's not a new message, but the same message God gave to Moses in the desert.   Simply live what you already know to be true and you can live forever in Heaven with God!  "You know what would make this message even better Jesus?   If you were to do a miracle here for us to prove it."  It was their deer.   Instead of realizing the beauty of what was right before them, God himself incarnated in the person of Christ, they wanted more.

He comes to us every day in the Sacraments offering that same salvation and He challenges us to live the message we already know to be true in our hearts.  As Moses said last week in the readings, It is not in some far off land or in the skies that someone must go and get it for us, it's right here in our hearts and on our lips.   Love.  Saint Camillus De Lellis, our Saint for the today, reminds us how to live that out.   By greeting Christ in His most distressing of disguises.   That whatever we do to the least of these, the poor, the sick, the widow, the orphan, the angry young man with a gun, the police officer shot in the line of duty, the family left behind... whatever we do for these, we do for Christ.   Are you ready to encounter Christ?   In the face of the sick and dying?   The old and the young?  The refugee?  The Muslim?  The Jew?  The Atheist?  We need to stop asking God to give us a sign to push us out into the world to do good, and just do good.    He's already given you a sign that goes beyond anything else you could ask for... He rose from the dead that you too might have eternal life.   Now go spread the good news!

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A Reflection on the readings for Monday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time: July 18, 2016.  Micah 6:1-4, 6-8; Psalm 50; A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew 12:38-42

Excuse the Mess!

How easy it is to forget the important things in life.   In the story of Martha and Mary we are reminded that some things are more important than the to do list.  Martha was running around hectic trying to get everything done that she felt needed to be done for her guests.  Mary though was sitting at the feet of Christ paying attention to Him.   I need to be reminded of this.  I am kind of anal when it comes to having a clean house and when we do have guests I am often the Martha.   Cleaning, washing, doing dishes I should have already finished, anxious and stressed.  I am missing the important thing, the guest.

Growing up my mother had a philosophy that went something like “house work can always be done, my kids will only be with me a short time.”   The house often wasn’t clean.   The laundry sometimes piled up well above the laundry basket.  The thing was we knew we were loved.  Mom spent as much time as we would let her with us.   We played, we laughed, we cried.  We did it as a family.   It’s a philosophy that all of us could learn from, especially when it comes to relationships.

Just the other day our friend Jennifer came over.   I was in the middle of a game online with three other people and while she stood talking to Julie, I kept playing.   I justified it because I was not alone in the game and three other people out there in cyber land were counting on me to finish this mission.  In reality I was missing an opportunity to sit at the feet of Christ.   To encounter Him in my friend who is made in His image.   To just be present, to treat her with dignity, and show her that she was more important to me than any game.  As rarely as we have guests in our home you’d think I would learn this lesson already.

Even more so, we have to remind ourselves to make time as well for that relationship with Jesus Christ in prayer and devotions.   Too often we fill our schedules up and then look for an hour here or a minute there to fit Him in.   When in reality we should simply empty our schedule and put Him in there first.   To make time for daily mass if possible, scripture study, Liturgy of the Hours, a rosary, or even just some silent time in which we listen for His voice speaking to us in the whisper of our hearts.   Are we making time for Him?  A relationship does not function if the two people never discourse.   Try it for a few days and you’ll find that even though you’re taking time to sit at Jesus feet, everything else seems to get done as well.  

His servant and yours,

Brian

“He must increase, I must decrease.”

A Reflection on the Mass Readings for the Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time: July 17, 2016. Genesis 18:1-10a; Psalm 15; Colossians 1:24-28; The Holy Gospel According to Saint Luke 10:38-42

Sourpusses!

"My dwelling, like a shepherd's tent, is struck down and born away from me."  A shepherd's tent is a hastily constructed tent that is only intended for the night.  Something that if the wind picks up is blown away and no longer to be found.  When the shepherd's move on they are often left in place and within a short time nothing is left but tatters and rags. One would be hard pressed to even tell what it was that had stood there.  It reminds me of the scene in the Wizard of Oz when the house circled in the tornado and you could see all of this being carried off with it.  Our dwelling though, is our body.  Hezekiah feels that his life is over and he mourns the loss. 

The readings remind us that this life is fleeting and finite.  That our only hope is in the Lord who made heaven and earth.  Hezekiah calls out to Him and He performs a miraculous healing and even makes the Sun itself move backwards in time to prove it will come about.   We often do a lot to extend our lives.  We diet, we exercise, we go to doctors time and again.   Those are all good things.   Do we take it to God in prayer?  He is the source of life itself.  Why do we only tend to do the physical while ignoring the spiritual half of our lives? 

One of the more serious temptations which stifles boldness and zeal is a defeatism which turns us into querulous and disillusioned pessimists, “sourpusses”. - Pope Francis

Some take it to extremes though.  Saint Francis at the end of his life looked back on all of the mortification he did on himself, the rough life that truly destroyed his health, and he realized that that was not good either.  God did not create us to live lives of dour, resent-filled hours.   He created us to be at peace and filled with joy.   Yes, to be a temporary structure, but one that is so filled with love that it is not concerned with the next moment.  A structure that just provide shelter to those in need in the present, not consumed with the ills of the past or the fears of the future.  Mortification is important, but we have to be careful how far we take it.  If it draws us closer to God?  Continue.   If it makes you feel hopeless or despair?  Get rid of it. 

Jesus reminds us that God gave us everything He gave us for our own benefit.  Even the Sabbath was not meant as something to make you starve yourself, but a day of rest in which you could commune with God and with one another.  It is not a rule made by a tyrant who sits around all day waiting to cross your name out of His book of life the moment you make a mistake, but one made by a loving Father who realizes His children often forget that they too need to take a day to rest and recover.  Be a shepherd's tent, but don't let the world blow you away before it is time.  Take a moment each day to recover, and a day each week to rest and contemplate the wonder of God's great gift to us.   All of our life is a gift, and the Gospel a treasure to make us fully human, not to punish us and turn us into 'sour pusses . ' 

His servant and yours, 

Brian 

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A Reflection on the Daily Mass readings for Friday of the fifteenth week of Ordinary time: July 15, 2016. Isaiah 38:1-6, 21-22, 7-8; Isaiah 38:10, 11, 12, 16; Matthew 12:1-8

I am a grown man, I'll eat what I want to eat!

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for I am meek and humble of heart;
and you will find rest for yourselves.
For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.
- Jesus

In my teens I attended an evangelical church that taught that these words meant that we were free to do anything and everything we wanted.   So I did.   If it felt good I did it, if it tasted good I ate it, if I wanted it? I took it.  That's freedom right? After all, freedom means being able to do whatever you want when you want, right?
 I want to defend myself and say "I wasn't a horrible person."   Yet, when I look back on some of the things I did I am not sure I can make that claim and be honest with myself.
True freedom is not being a slave to our passions and desires.   It means being able to say yes or no, regardless of what our minds or bodies tell us to do.  A person who is truly free can be chaste and avoid doing those things which his body desires.   They can avoid being a glutton, no more cake for me please, I've had enough.   They can walk into the flames of a fire to save another soul even though the pain of the burns they receive scream at them to run the other way.   That's true freedom, being disciplined enough and free enough to decide for yourself, regardless of what peer pressure, hormones, and all those other influences call for you to do.

The thing about a yoke that I did not realize as a teen is it is only easy when you go where it is leading you.  When we read that verse from Isaiah we see the path of the just is smooth and and level.  The just.  That is a person who lives out the justice of God, not a person who simply does what they wish.  When we go along with God's will, when we seek out that which is good and noble, that's when the yoke is easy and the burden is light.   That doesn't mean a bed of roses.   Today is the feast day of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha.  This young woman walked with the yoke of Christ on her shoulders.  In reward for it her people starved her, threw rocks at her as she went to church, and eventually she had to flee to a different area to live in peace.  In all of it, she went where Christ asked her to go.

The reason the yoke is so easy though is it's something we are innately wired to do.  Yes, there are those out there who have been broken by society, their parents, or traumatic experiences.  All of those are created in the image of God, we were born to live out the simple truth of God's justice: love.  When Moses spoke to the people earlier this week he said that the message we have received is not something lofty in the skies that we must beg a bird to go get it, nor is it something distant and hidden that we must send someone on a quest to find it, rather it is already on our tongues and written in our hearts.   We already know what is right to do, but we choose to do what is easy, what is comfortable.  Are you listening to God when he speaks to you?  Are you following the yoke when it pulls to the left or the right?  Or trying to forge your own path?

Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, pray for us.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

A reflection on the daily Mass readings for Thursday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time, July 14, 2016. Isaiah 26:7-9, 12, 16-19; Psalm 102; The Holy Gospel According to Saint Matthew 11:28-30

She died in her sleep...

My daughter knows that if she asks me for something to eat I will give it to her.  It did not matter if it was two in the morning or the afternoon, if she was hungry I fed her.   I explained to my wife that one of my father's relatives had a daughter who asked for another piece of cake very late in the night and her mother refused to let her have it.   She sent her to bed without that piece of cake.  That daughter died in her sleep.  To this day I will feed a child, regardless of what time it is, if they tell me they are hungry. 

Think of the boldness of those of us who proclaim that God is our Father.   In the prayer that Jesus taught us we say simply, "Give us this day our daily bread."   Recently when meditating on this I pictured myself as a child with my hands out, simply asking God for a piece of bread.  The image in my mind reminded me of the stance we take when going up to receive communion in hand. We place our hands forward as a throne, like children, like beggars.  In asking simply God rewards greatly, giving us not just bread, but the body soul and divinity of Christ.  He gives us more than we ask for, far better than we deserve.

As Christians we are called to live out our lives in the image of Him who we have been created in.  That is, we are to emulate God in our actions, in our thoughts, and our words.  That's a challenging thing when you think of the image of God as Father, as the one who is being asked for sustenance, peace, and tranquility.  He provides freely, generously, and more powerfully than we ourselves even expect.  Forgiving our sins, meeting both our physical and spiritual needs, while also helping us to move forward and grow into the person we are created to be.  We can find the source of that image in Christ himself. 

That's our challenge then isn't it?  To be childlike in our faith in that we trust God to reach out to us and give us what we need, but also to be the image of the invisible God to those who are hurting, frustrated, and lacking in their lives.  We ourselves receive Christ in the Eucharist, then we must go out into the world and share it with those who have not.  By giving food and drink to the widow, the orphan, the refugee... the moment they ask, and even more than they ask for.   Also, in giving spiritually to all in need.  This is what it means to love.  To treat people as a whole, not as a part.  To interact with them more than on a superficial level, but on a level that unites us as one body.. That's what happens when we encounter Christ at the Mass... are we allowing that to happen when we encounter Christ in His most distressing disguises? 

His servant and yours, 

Brian 

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A Reflection on the Daily Mass Readings for Wednesday of the Fifteenth Week of Ordinary time: July 13, 2016.   Isaiah 10:5-7, 13b-16; Psalm 94; A Reading from the Holy Gospel According to Matthew 11:25-27